Age and gender effect on emotional intelligence and emotion regulation

Emotional intelligence considered as the ability to recognize, understand, and regulate emotions. Emotional intelligence is one of the important modulators of social relationships. The aim of the work is to study age and gender effect on emotional intelligence and emotional self-regulation in three age children groups (between 11-15, 16-18, 19-20 ages old). Emotional intelligence was measured by using adapted versions of the questionnaires "Emotional Intelligence" and "Emotion Regulation". Forty-nine volunteers participated in the current study. Preliminary results revealed the tendency to increase the parameters of emotional intelligence scales with age and prevalence in reappraisal regulation strategy over the suppression in older children. The prevalence in reappraisal strategy which is more favorable and effective strategy of self-regulation showed higher score in girls’ group in comparison to boys’ group. Larger sample of children in the age range from 6 to 20 years is expected to show more significant changes between age groups.